Personally, I'm not sure what I believe in. Religion is a hard subject for me to speak about because I don't know what I believe, I have my own code that I live by built upon what I see to be right or wrong, not by what is written in a book. I believe that life begins to end, from the moment you are born you are simply here to die, what you do with your life is up to you.

At times I think that people are just a random occurance, simply here because the conditions of the planet allowed us to form and become alive. People are the only beings on earth conscious of their existance which somehow pushes me to believe that we have been placed here for some reason.

I don't know what to expect after death so I'm living my life for myself, right now.

Since I'll never know if there is life after death I'm living my life the best I can right now so that people will judge me by the fact that I was a good man. That's what I hope to accomplish with my life, not to be accepted into an afterlife but to be remembered as a good person by those who knew me in this world.

I'm glad to be able to express my thoughts on a subject like this here, there aren't many forums where people can have an intelligent discussion about religion without some jerk flaming or trying to convert them to their religion and for that I'm pleased to have this place.

I dont belive in a god or goddess or anything in a matter of fact... and this is something that realy boders me at night sometimes... if there is truly a god and he put us on earth... why? is this some sort of sick and sadistic joke?... that we are doom to die since the beggining of our birth... that many die unjustly and so many more are tormented in diferrent levels of anguish... and he or she does nothing but sit and watch as all unfolds before his eyes... how generations and generations of men and women die in his name... even if there is a god I would not worship him... or look up to him for hope...

maybe its because I'm young and iggnorant but this is what I truly believe in the deepest bowels of my heart... and if I would to say something else it would be a lie... it might be sad but true...

no matter what I believe... I try not to jude others by their religion... and I also try to respect their belives... no matter how much I'm against it or despise it...

i don't believe in any of this god, jesus crap. (no offense to those who do) which im not sure but i think that makes me a aetheist?

Religion eh?
Well first of all, I don't belive in christianity in the way that the church has thought us in all these years.
There is so much more to it. I do belive that there is something to this Jesus guy, and it don't hurt to read about his wise words. There is lots of books and writings that the church keeps hushed down, I mean like the meanings in this Davinci Code for example.
Jesus even talks about reincarnation, IN THE BIBLE, which is interpreted differently by the church. But don't ask me in where in the Bible that is, I don't personally understand it, it's just what I learned in school. (But if you insist I could look it up for you.)
But I do belive that there is so much more to this world then what we see and can figure out with science.
And I do belive that there is an afterlife and that we have souls, and that there is much we humans have still to learn about our souls and this world and beyond.

I don't believe in any religion whatsoever, jsut doesn't appeal to me. But that's just me, feel free to believe whatever you want folks (not that i could stop you anyway )
And's that's pretty much all i have to say on the subject. Sorry for those who expected some kind of long, well thought out reply

EDIT: On second thoughts, my original statement may have been offensive ot more religious people, so i've replaced it

just out of... Da Vinci was a scientist, a smart guy and observator to the world, mostly. All this hype about him being the greatest conspirator against catholic church of all time is simply not to be taken all too serious. He was just a guy, who quite naturally opposed everything church told the people, as he saw, and understood how the world really works. I believe that he wouldn't have put secret messages in his works, simply because he didn't care. He was a sarcastic type of person, but he didn't like to argue about things, being useless to him. There is also too much being freely available nowadays for the catholic church being able to keep her dignity... if people would start to think for themselves for once...
Anyway that just as a sidenote.

For me religion is a great thing for people who need it. Wanna believe in Allah? Fine. In Jahwe, Jesus, El, Baal..? Right. Believe in Lucifer or bloody Vampires? I don't care, as long as everybody may freely think/believe what he wants to think/believe. Religion, just as everything else what human beings do, is a good thing, until it gets institutionalized, used out of will to power.

Ahhh damn, i gotta stop throughing my cents around, getting poor real fast that is...

Well, Da Vinci code was a bad example to put here, my mistake. There is not much in that book that could be concidered as "accurate" information. The only message that there is there, is about Maria Magdalena, who was Jesus wife. And that is that there sure was such a person.

This post has been edited by Fethenwen: May 16 2006, 12:02 AM

. . . Uh . . . Where do you find this information? In my 13 years of being indoctrinated in the Christian faith I have never came across that. Actually I did, in some talk with a conspiracy theorist.

Anyways..

Organized Religion = Teh Suckz

The Faith = Great

I am a horrible christian, I don't go to church on sundays, I scoff at our communion because the wafers taste stale, and I think our pastor is Hitler incarnate. (I do the hail hitler thing to him every time)

But your faith, your belief, is what is in your heart. And I believe that Jesus Christ, Son of God, died on the cross for the atonement of our sins. As such, because I've repent (to Jesus, not a preacher, or a pope) my soul has been save from the blazing damnation of hell.

God does not condem anyone to death. In the begining (after god created everything) Adam and Eve messed it up for the rest of us.. Giving ourselves free will...

I'll continue later, the Prez is speaking.. (oh buddy)

Daedra worship for me!

Heh. Just kidding.

I'm Atheist myself. I simply believe that if you live your life the way you want to, do good deeds, be a good person, and make some sort of impact on this earth, then you go to your own personal paradise. I don't like to believe that there is simply nothing after death.

I like to believe what the ancient Egyptians believed about death; that it is only the beginning of a journey.

well if you have to believe in god to go to heavan i guess im going to hell. i mean c'mon all we have is a 3000 page sleeping pill as proof. for evolution we have a little thing called proof.

I dont remember what religion this relates to actually, but I always remember being told a certain religious story at one primary school I had to go to (where they forced you to pray), and it stuck with me. Its about some pharaoh, persecuting people, god gets angry and does all this vengeful stuff. Now some of this for some reason, involved killing kids.

It always stuck with me how barbaric some of these religions used to be. That changed mostly now I think, at least in some cases. Just that the wrath of God in that particular story sounded just like the wrath of an all powerful sicko. Not really something a benevolent God would do?

I dont know what the problem with that davinci code is though. Most religious people I meet seem to think its just based on a load of rubbish. And I think its just a bit of fiction myself. So I dont see what all that controversy is about. Let those who wanna watch it watch it and those that dont, dont. Same should be said for everything if you ask me, no more "Oooo! That offends my beliefs!".

What? people are opposing the da vinci code now? Jeeze some people are stupid, there was a sudden increase of people being offended after the Danish cartoon (which I actaully thought was very bad but I can understand how someone wouldn't realise its offence), the Muslims got applogies so several other religions got jealous *cough*Catholics*cough* and decided they needed to get offended by everything in hopes of some attention. I'm not saying all catholics are attention seeking whores, just a lot of attention seeking whores decided to be catholic

ummm... Actually the Catholics were offended by the Da Vinci Code in the 80's (or was it the 90's?) and the Muslims were insulted... this year.
What I find odd is: The Muslims have one little cartoon make fun of thier religon and they get all kinds of land from other countries, and money.... the list goes on.... just beacuse thier a minority.

While the main stream Christians are insulted everyday by: Family Guy, The Simpsons, Etc.... And the Christians get nothing, just because thier a majority. Thats absolute Bull-****.

Really though its just about how many extra rights a minority get over regular people. I don't really care about Religon.

I didn't know about them with the Da vinci code, but I have seen them try to ban Family guy, South park and a few others since the Muslim thing, not sure about simpsons. And are you sure its the Catholics who are offended by the Da Vinci code? I would have thought it would be the Cathars (or however you spell it) since they are shown as an extreme Christian cult when they are just a slightly strange religious group. Muslim thing is offensive because it is offensive to draw the prophet Mohammad in certain Muslim denominations (not all which is why there have been some paintings around), you may also notice those denominations also don't have pictures of their families for religious reasons so you can understand how serious it is, it is like assualting one of their family members; which is a lot worse than south park. The reason South Park can get away with insulting majorities is because several people who make the cartoons are likely to be Catholic and the writers most likely are friends with multiple Catholics, its just kidding around, the Danish cartoons however were done perhaps with good intentions but also with a lot of ignorance and not everyone is going to see it for the first.

Man, the point wasn't the religon... It was the Bull about Minorities and them getting everything just cause of a little insult. Like, hell, I've been made fun of all me life, harrased beaten by other people etc... But just cause I'm Catholic & Irish I get nothing, but if most of that happened to a African kid and he told, then there would be lawsuits, sueing and a whole scandal about it. I just think its unfair that minorities get sooo much exra.

I feel I need to find my spirituality. Unfortunately for me, that is no easy task. I go by the term Agnostic, though its unsuited to me.

This post has been edited by TheStranger: May 16 2006, 01:22 PM

Ironically, his real last name, Duchovny, can be roughly translated to Serbian as "Spiritual"


"Nail in my hand/By my creator
You gave me life/Now show me how to live"
[Audioslave, Show me how to live]

I am babtised as an Orthodox Christian. I am probably The Worst Orthodox Christian in the country (although, nowadays competition is preety rough ). I still honor our saints and Jesus (proper name is Isus Hristos), but God... I am angry with him. Not at all scared, but angry. If I get a chance to meet him after the death I'll use that oportunity to tell him what a lousy job he's doing - no matter what happens. Hypno has the right idea about suffering, but ony to some point. We all need to feel the pain to be aware of it. We all need to sense suffering in order to (at least) try and imagine how someone else feels, because empathy really doesen't exist in real world. And finaly, we all feel the need to explain things to ourselves - why are we here, on Earth, what is our purpose, where are we 'going'... Eating, Sleeping, Defecation, Procreation - what's the point ? I do believe someone created Universe, but it is completely different matter if that 'someone' is truly interested in us, or is he/she/it interested in us more then, say, ants ? And if so, why is that - so we could slaughter animals and rape nature on daily basis without overwhelming feeling of guilt ? Meh. I still think he's doing a lousy job, and I think so in a very 'John Constantine' way (sorry about my male shovinism ).


Indeed. People who like to bash Jesus Christ forget that he was a man how, in the first place, torn down the dogma that surrounded Jewish religion in those days. He was a man, before everything else, that preached tolerance, understanding, morality and love. And he was the man who died because of his beliefs. I MIGHT not hold too much respect for God in my heart nowadays, but I hold respect for his son and every other martyr, regardless of their religion, who led a good, moral life. I know I caould not be like that in a million years, but I know that much to honor them. And that is why I still go to church - because of Jesus's messages and because of our own patron saintess, St. Petka.


Let's just face it - we're all a bunch of horrible heretics and we're all going to Hell ! ® Muahahahaha !

I guess I just don't get offended easily, but I will agree with Darkhunter.. it always seems the minority has the biggest voice..

Heh, I'm going to go watch Family Guy now

Channler, it seems to me the gigantic religious right from the bible belt has a voice that deafens all others, but that's just me.

Also, you agree for those two parts in the bible (two sentences in the whole book), and I don't mean to offend, but you simply pick and choose which parts to believe in and which parts not to?

I could make a lot of critical judgments about the bible. For instance, if Jesus died on a certain date, just as he was born on a certain date, and then he again walked the Earth just a week later, why isn't the date of his death and the date when he resurrected stapled, as is the date of his birth? How come the date he died changes every year in relation to the moon? Well, one answer is because that date is phony, based on the spring equinox, a holiday already celebrated at the time of easter-week, by the romans. When they were trying to spread christianity to the Romans, they used their holidays already in place, and just the changed the meanings of the holidays. I could go on about that for a long time, but I'll leave it at just that one example.

You don't follow organized religion, then do you give yourself the freedom to believe which parts of the bible you want. I know the born-again (and mormon, and jahova's witness) tradition is that only 144,000 people make it paradise at the end of the world, despite the millions of the people that think they're going to be one of those 144,000.

I know most religions along the Jesus-worship line say you are a sinner because you have free will, and that only if you accept jesus will you be saved, why did only the jews get a chance to accept jesus? Why didn't every group of people on earth from every corner get a chance to accept jesus before they died on their own terms, instead of being forced to wait for crazy ministers preaching that they have to clothe themselves and that condoms are evil?

That is my main problem, and again I mean no offense, and I hope nothing I say gives reason for this topic to be closed or for it to lose its civility, but do you believe despite the fact that I tremble indignation at every injustice, and that I weep at murder and greed, because I chose to be faithful to something that isn't Jesus, something unnamed, because I do not believe he died on the cross for my sins, no matter how much I try at every end of my life to do good and bring peace, I will be forced to go to Hell?